


dig

by min_mintobe



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Character Study, M/M, Mostly Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-14
Updated: 2020-09-14
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:48:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26462932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/min_mintobe/pseuds/min_mintobe
Summary: He's not good enough.There is nothing new he brings to the team, nothing the dozen setters before him haven't already tried. Atsumu knows he's good, very good, but no one is very impressed. Everyone here is very, very good at what they do.Miya Atsumu, and the years in between eighteen and twenty-two.
Relationships: Miya Atsumu/Sakusa Kiyoomi
Comments: 41
Kudos: 318





	dig

> **Dig in**
> 
> **__** _1\. To begin to eat heartily._

Atsumu graduates hungry. 

His first taste of real volleyball is sour milk. 

Ex-captain of Inarizaki, back to being treated like a baby. And he _is_ a baby, the first few months, brawling and angry and starving. Still a teenager, still quick to anger, without a twin to take it out on. Without anyone he knows to lean on. 

Professional volleyball is a whole different ball game. Here there are players so old and so strong they don't even spare him a glance in the locker room. There are players so good and so indifferent it breaks his heart to hear them shrug off extra practice.

 _It's just a job_ , they say, brushing past him on their way out straight after matches. Atsumu doesn't understand. Volleyball is _everything_. He stays, practising serves, practising spikes, practising tosses. Salt drips from his skin. He leaves after the sun sets, starving in more ways than one. 

He's not good enough. 

There is nothing new he brings to the team, nothing the dozen setters before him haven't already tried. Atsumu knows he's good, very good, but no one is very impressed. Everyone here is very, very good at what they do. They train, and they play, and they lose.

His team is not good enough. 

The first time someone fails to hit his toss, he whips around and says _scrub—_ the way he'd always used to. There's a bad silence. 

The next day he has to bow and apologise. It tastes like nothing he's ever tasted before.

He warms the bench next practice, and learns to hold his peace. He earns his place on court again, and learns to smile. He becomes _Miya_ , just _Miya_ , and no one calls him _Atsumu_ anymore. They don't need to.

> **Dig deep**
> 
> **__** _1\. To exert oneself mentally or physically._

Atsumu's been the better Miya for years, with Osamu to back him up at every stumble. But now Osamu isn't there, and the ground crumbles behind him. He stands with his heels on the edge of a precipice, and refuses to look back.

_Who needs memories?_

He learns to dig his toes in, to bend his knees, to press his feet into the ground. To slide himself under each pass, no matter how low, and elevate it to perfection.

 _Nice kill_ , he says, praising the spikers who rise to meet his toss. They nod and laugh, and Atsumu laughs along for them. Practice is brutal, and his fingertips tear apart even after years of high school volleyball. Ten fingers are still better, and he's still a setter. He keeps playing, and he keeps smiling.

He watches as some of the greatest players of his generation stumble and falter and fall. 

Hinata Shouyou, the nasty little decoy, fails to bait any of the V-League teams into making an offer. 

Oikawa Tooru, the great general, wins no wars and slips away into obscurity. 

Ushijima Wakatoshi, the southpaw cannon, implodes onto his own team and costs the nation a match they cannot afford to lose.

Atsumu knows second place just means first place loser. 

He fights, for two whole years, and doesn't even come close to beating Kageyama Tobio. 

_Goody-two-shoes_ , he'd said once, underestimating the quiet boy he'd first met at seventeen. Two years later he has to swallow his own words and the bitterness of watching the national team brighten when Oikawa's junior jogs onto court.

Selfishly, for the first time _—_ Atsumu wishes Osamu had never played volleyball.

Atsumu thinks he could be better than Kageyama, better than Oikawa, better than Iizuna and Koganegawa and every other monster setter so beloved by the V-League now. If he'd only known from the start how to do it proper, how to do it right. He has a year to catch up on a lifetime of people skills, and he works at it as hard as he works at his serves. 

_None of them like you_ , Osamu tells him once, long ago. 

_I don't care_ , Atsumu'd answered. 

He hadn't cared, for years. He doesn't need to. He's good at volleyball, and that's all that matters. Boys want to be on his team. Girls scream his name when he walks onto court. He's still good at volleyball. But it's no longer the only thing that matters. 

He cares now. 

He smiles before he's smiled at, and does his best to say good morning first. He bows a little lower than he needs to, and always offers to help. He learns that playing volleyball is a job, and that being good at the job means a lot more than being good at playing volleyball. He tries to feel full while biting his tongue. 

It's not enough. 

Then one day Bokuto Koutarou walks into the MSBY locker room, and threatens to undo all of Atsumu's hard work. Old words fly from his tongue.

"If you screw up and fail to score off one of my sets _—_ "

"I'm just the ace, now." Bokuto says, smiling.

Atsumu hates how easily he says it. He thinks he knows how much it might have cost Bokuto to become the player he is now. He remembers the long sulks, the legendary tantrums. 

_Just the ace_ , Bokuto says.

"Just score," Atsumu tells him, "and we're cool." 

Bokuto scores. Barnes scores. Bessho scores. They score because of him. They score over and over again, and when they laugh Atsumu laughs with them. His fingers have long calloused over. His heart no longer bleeds. Winning is honey-sweet. 

It's enough. 

Then one day many months later Sakusa Kiyoomi walks in. Atsumu thinks he's got a better handle on his heart than he had when Bokuto'd joined. He doesn't threaten Sakusa.

"Welcome to the team," he tells Sakusa.

"Who did you kill to swap personalities with your brother," Sakusa asks. "Fuck off."

"I love you," Atsumu answers, giddy with joy to have him.

> **Dig**
> 
> Slang. 
> 
> _1\. To take notice of._
> 
> _2\. To understand, enjoy, or appreciate._
> 
> _3\. To like (romantically)._


End file.
